UK Stocks-Factors to watch on August 12

Reuters Staff

4 Min Read

(Adds futures, company news)
LONDON, Aug 12 (Reuters) - Britain's FTSE 100 index is seen opening
down by around 40 points, or 0.6 percent lower, according to financial
bookmakers. Futures were down 0.8 percent ahead of the cash market open.
For more on the factors affecting European stocks, please click on
* The UK blue chip index closed 1.1 percent lower on Tuesday, led by mining
companies and luxury firm Burberry after China devalued its currency,
raising the costs of imports.
* PEARSON - Pearson, fresh from agreeing the sale of the Financial
Times newspaper to Japan's Nikkei, said on Wednesday it would sell its 50
percent stake in the Economist Group for 469 million pounds ($730.6 million) to
its existing investors. [ID;nASM000BJH]
* GLAXOSMITHKLINE - The drugmaker closed its North Carolina factory
on Tuesday after testing at a cooling tower found bacteria that causes deadly
Legionnaire's disease, a company spokeswoman said.
* MARKS & SPENCER - Britain's biggest clothing retailer has parted
company with its head of womenswear less than a month after the boss of its
non-food division quit the business.
* BP - Heavy damage to the largest crude distillation unit at BP
Plc's 413,500-barrel-per-day (bpd) Whiting, Indiana, refinery will require at
least a month to repair, sources familiar with the refinery's plans said on
Tuesday.
* CENTRICA - Britain's Rough natural gas storage site is undergoing
an outage on Wednesday due to essential maintenance, operator Centrica said.
* ROYAL DUTCH SHELL - The U.S. Coast Guard has been forced to
divert resources - including a vessel that fights cocaine trafficking - to the
Arctic this summer to ensure that Royal Dutch Shell's RDSa.L exploratory oil
drilling meets its environmental and safety commitments, its top officer said.
* STANDARD CHARTERED - The government of Myanmar has appointed
Citigroup and Standard Chartered as advisors to help it win its first
credit rating, the banks said on Wednesday.
* G4S - G4S, the British group that stocks ATMs, runs prisons and
protects airports, met expectations with a 5 percent rise in first-half adjusted
operating profit, and said productivity improvements would continue to feed
through in the second half. [ID;nFWN10M04O]
* INTERSERVE - The support services and construction firm posted a
12 percent rise in half-year profit and said it was confident of future growth
as demand in its main markets continued to strengthen.
* ZOOPLA - Property website Zoopla is winning back
agents after months of losing listings to rivals, it said on Wednesday.
* BALFOUR BEATTY - The troubled infrastructure firm said it
expected to have resolved 90 percent of its historic problematic UK contracts by
the end of 2016, as it sought to reassure shareholders following a string of
profit warnings.
* TESCO - Bids are to be slashed for Tesco's data company
Dunnhumby, the Financial Times reported.
* UK CORPORATE DIARY:
CAL.L Capital & Regional PLC Earnings Releases
GFS.L G4S PLC Earnings Releases
NEPI.L New Europe Property Investments PLC Earnings Releases
MRKT.OQ Markit Ltd Earnings Releases
CLSH.L CLS Holdings PLC Earnings Releases
BALF.L Balfour Beatty PLC Earnings Releases
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(Reporting by Liisa Tuhkanen)